Posts Tagged ‘teacher’

JACK NANUQ currently makes his living as a Private Investigator; hence the nom de guere (and no profile photo). Prior this occupation he lived the nine lives of a cat. He has been a teacher, police officer, park ranger, equipment operator, freight handler and even a ranch hand.

He has lived and worked in Egypt, Alaska, Oregon and New York (the State, not the City). He has snorkeled in the Red Sea. Slept on the Nile River and under the Northern Lights (but not at the same time). Walked among grizzlies, ridden his bike under the midnight sun, climbed Mt St Helens, and even jumped out of a perfectly good airplane.

He and his wife currently live on a small farm near Albany, NY. They share this property with three dogs, three cats, a handful of chickens and two peacocks. He enjoys, outdoor activities, writing, Tae Kwon Do and teaching self-defense.

How does a POW become a spy? And why? And what the hell is a GALCO? These are only a few of the questions Carson Nowak needs answers to.

Carson Nowak is a CIA contractor like none you’ve ever met before.Shortly after George W Bush is elected president Carson is tasked with retrieving a trunk load of documents.The order comes not from the Agency or even the President; but a higher authority, his Nana.In addition to the documents the trunk contains a war relic that is tied to a mysterious death just before D-Day.Tracing the provenance behind this relic triggers a chain of events that not only unlocks Carson’s family history but garners the interest of a South American hit squad. Carson must navigate the challenges of protecting his family, maintaining his business, ensuring the safety of a refugee developing a revolutionary weapons system, and deal with an infuriating curmudgeon.Along the way he falls in love.To navigate these challenges he must enlist the help of a pencil-thin code breaker, a claustrophobic corpsman and a Haitian nurse.

Carson Nowak navigated the minefield that was his great-grandmother’s attic; careful to step where the random boards were nailed to the joists. The dry-rotted flooring had the structural integrity of toilet paper. No need to crash through the ceiling; that would really set her off. Moldy boxes, piles of clothes and garish Christmas decorations, all covered in layers of dust and pigeon poop, further complicated the task.

He glanced at the map, drawn on the back of a piece of junk mail. The queen of recycling, Nana never threw anything away without finding at least a second use for it. He spotted the old tarp. The steamer trunk should be under that mess. Carson sighed, “Any farther away and it would have been in the neighbor’s house.”

What the hell am I doing? he thought. Carson had tried to talk her out of this fool’s errand, but she insisted it be brought downstairs. When he showed reluctance, she screamed at him in the four languages she knew best. Then in the one she knew the least; English.

An
anthology dedicated to Melissa Lee, bringing together stories of
strong independent women by some of today’s favorite authors of the
indie community.

When
Melissa was diagnosed with cancer it shook our house to the core.
Within a matter of days we started asking how can we help. The answer
create an anthology dedicated to the strong woman that is our
Melissa. Each story as a set of rules. one the main character is
named Melissa. And her character must be strong. After that each
story comes from the hearts of our authors. This book is forever
dedicated to the teacher that touches the lives of the children that
she meet. The authors who’s lives have now been touched with
her soft touch and strong will. And for the member of our family who
we wish only the very best.

*All
proceeds will be benefitting Melissa Lee during this difficult time.
Our hearts & prayers are with her.

~*
A special thanks to YM Zachery for her endless dedication

Melissa’s
Menagerie by Lori
Hoopengardner

After the death of her parents, Melissa was
on her own to carry on her family’s secret. She was lonely, scared
and busy. That is until she found some people she could trust.
Friendships and more just seemed to happen.

The
Rainbow Truck by Jeremy
Simons

On the backroads of Louisiana, the unthinkable
happened to Melissa. A truck tried to run her off the road. She could
have let it go, but she was too proud for that. Besides, its color
intrigued her. Oh yeah, and the blood on the tailgate.

She
and Scott followed it to a secluded camp where their fortunes were
forever sealed. She had to fight. She had to stand on her own two
feet. She had to…survive.

But could it be that easy? Find out in
The Rainbow Truck.

Unbound
Wonder by Niki
Livingston

Melissa’s past doesn’t define her and she
refuses to allow her teenage trauma to hold her down. Believing in
herself when no one else did, she became an instant fame in the music
industry. And with the public eye on her, it wasn’t a surprise when
she attracted a male admirer who didn’t have her best interest at
heart. Another man who only craved to control and own her.

Now she
must face her fears, both known and unknown, in order to gain the
strength to battle the seemingly never-ending storm threatening her
very existence. Rising to face her foes is only the beginning to
taking back her power.

Lovelightby B. Tolentino

Blind
but never felt unwanted, Melissa Chaplin lives peacefully in New
Hampshire with her mother. Wanting to make progress in her life, she
decides to take a step forward by applying for a part-time job only
to be rejected as soon as she receives the phone call she was so
excited about. Suddenly, the bruising pain of frustration of being
visually impaired envelopes her, causing her to take a huge leap of
faith by agreeing to be a patient to a doctor from Germany she meets
for the first time.

Running
from Ghosts by Cam Johns

Not
telling the whole truth is the same as lying. It turns out,
withholding secrets is more dangerous than being honest with the one
you love. At least that’s what Melissa has come to realize. Now
being forced to face her deceptions head on as the ghosts of her past
come back to haunt her – threatening the life she has finally built –
Melissa has to find a way to confront her dishonesty without losing
the love of her life.

Onus
by Sonya Jesus

Oliver: In onus memoria. I had it engraved on his
tombstone so that when I went to visit, I could remember Ben died
because I failed to protect him. In my onus, I let guilt corrode
through any attempt at happiness. I let the blame overwhelm me
because I deserved to be punished… He died because I wasn’t
watching.

Melissaby Davina Purnell

Oliver’s
been coming to group sessions for a year and half now. I wish I could
say he’s slowly getting better, but he’s shown no progress and it
worries me. I don’t know how to break through to him or if he even
wants me to, but I care about him too much not to try.

Till
Death by Bella Emy

Happily
Ever After.

That’s what Mel thought she had found the day she met
Brad.

Now, married for years with their two children, Austin and
Brayden, Mel fears for their life. The man she once knew who had been
so loving, supporting and caring has turned into a drunk, alcoholic,
abusive husband and father, stopping at nothing to get his point
across.

Will Mel be able to overcome her dread of living huddled
up in a corner, fearing for her life and that of her sons, or will
Brad place his hands on her one last and final time?

Witch’s
Heart by Melanie
Rodriguez

Melissa is a sophomore at the prestigious Circe
Academy, a school that grooms only the finest of witches and
warlocks. She finds herself an outcast to most of her peers and
professors due to her half-human side. Wanting nothing more than to
be a fully-fledged witch, she enlists the help of the wily and
sarcastic spirit fox, Vic, who too has his own agenda. In order to
retrieve the lost half of magic that she needs to accomplish her
goal, Melissa must locate the human the old ritual demands she needs
and must steal their “heart.” When she realizes who that human
is, Melissa finds herself in a bind: does she complete her goal and
fulfill her pact with Vic or does she let the special human go and
continue to live her outcast life without the respect she deserves?

Choices
Made by Justina Luther

At
the age of 26 I, Melissa Leighton, thought I had my priorities right.
I worked hard, kept my eye on my goals, and loved my mom and twin
sister with all my heart. I broke my back to make us all proud and be
the first in my family to become a doctor. The funny thing about life
is, every choice we make changes something and the choices I made
threatened to change everything.

My
Shadow by Sheri Chapman

Melissa
is drawn to wrong side of the law. For now, she contents her intrigue
by pitting herself against the police. Through her own vices, she
must figure out crimes before they can. Not only does it inspire her
writing career, but it also gives her life an exciting edge. However,
Melissa is being watched. The innovative woman must determine if her
life in endanger before it’s too late…

From
the Ashes by Sarah Stein

How
far would you go to survive?

Melissa was the perfect child. She
never complained, did amazing in school and made her parents happy.
Or so she thought. Everything changed when she was told to pack her
bags, and leave with a man she’s never met. But all is not what it
seems as she has to fight not to lose herself in his custody.

Catina worked her way through college as a TV reporter and a dating game show host. She’s a sucker for Young Adult romance stories (both real and make-believe). She has a panache for match-making and loves that many of her “set-ups” have resulted in marriages.

After spending most of her adult life in Las Vegas, Catina traded in tumbleweeds for earthquakes and now lives with her husband and four children near San Diego, California. If she’s not home, chances are you can find her at the beach, Disneyland or In-N-Out Burger.

Angela Larkin writes clean teen romance and is a big fan of kissing (in life and in books). She’s been a gold miner, a pool cleaner, a mannequin dresser, and a teacher. She’s lived a true romance: meeting her husband in a case of mistaken identity. They recently moved with their four children from the sparkling city of Las Vegas to the shade of the North Carolina Pines. Chances are, she’s reading past bedtime.

“Dangerous. Wrong.
She could be so close to finding out who I really am, and I don’t want to think about how badly that could damage her. If I have any conscience, I’ll turn and run. But I can’t let her go.”Presley Hale has no idea the guy she just told off in the school parking lot died in a drowning accident four months ago. Why would she? It’s not like she knows she can see the dead. Stunned by Presley’s sixth sense, Landon Blackwood rethinks his planned departure and begins tracking her to find answers to their mysterious connection.

When their complicated relationship turns dangerous, they learn that tampering with the boundaries of death comes with consequences. Can Landon save Presley from the insidious spirits who have marked her for death, or was their love doomed from the beginning?

Several nearby classmates watched me appraise my Jeep, which I could see even from across the parking lot, dripped with yellow slime. This was just the latest slap in the face of my first week at Truckee High.

My first day of school, someone was kind enough to smear a roast beef hoagie on my windshield. It took five bucks in quarters at the do-it-yourself car wash to clean off the mayo haze.

Day three. After P.E., my clothes disappeared from the girls’ locker room forcing me to finish out the day in my uniform. These small-town punks made it hard to fly under the radar. I just wanted to get my senior year done and get out of this place.

Most people would be furious at these anonymous jerks. But I was madder at my mom for moving Chase and me two weeks before my senior year started.

“It’s a great opportunity, Pres,” she’d said. For who? I could live with the change, but this was going to be hard on Chase.

It wasn’t that Truckee, California didn’t have its perks. At the very least it was different from Vegas. Towering Ponderosa pines covered the mountains and enveloped every structure in town. Like they gave permission for each building to exist, but they loomed, threatening to reclaim the real estate. I’d smiled at the first of many baby pine trees I’d noticed growing like weeds in the cracks of the sidewalks.

Truckee was pretty quiet with school back in session but I could tell by the rows of ski rental shops and paddle board stores that winter and summer would be a different story. Lake Tahoe, with its freakishly clear blue water, was a pleasant surprise, as I’d spent the last two years in the Mojave Desert where the only nearby lake was a carp-filled stink hole. Cool town. Not-so-cool people.

Taking a deep breath and pulling my shoulders back, I walked to my Jeep. The tell-tale sting of tears betrayed me as eggshells crunched under my shoes. Trying to appear casual and composed, I pulled a hair band from my wrist and gathered my uncooperative curls into a top knot. I turned my back on a group of eager spectators, and hefted my bag onto an egg-free patch of hood to dig for my keys. My phone vibrated. I ignored it.

Of course my keys were lost in the black abyss of my backpack. I felt unwelcomed eyes on me as I searched. Finally, with keys in hand I opened the door and hurled my bag onto the passenger seat.

Then, I caught sight of a face I hadn’t seen before.

A good eight to ten cars away, he stood at the edge of the parking lot in the shade of the pines, arms folded across his chest, and studied me like some nightclub bouncer who was handed a fake I.D. (If bouncers looked like raven-haired H&M models.) The boy was shameless. He stared, unabashedly, and the longer he looked at me, the more flattered I felt.

That is, until I realized what he was probably looking for a reaction to my messed up Jeep. Wasn’t that what the girls behind me were smugly discussing? Wasn’t that why those freshman boys avoided eye contact when I walked by?

My cheeks flamed and I surprised myself by yelling across the lot at him, “What? What are you looking at?”

He flinched and unfolded his arms. His eyes locked onto mine and I matched him.

“Yeah, you!” I jabbed my chin in the air. Bring it dude.

His eyes narrowed, and then he started toward me. An older man I hadn’t noticed before quickly grabbed his shoulder and tried to pull him back. The boy became upset and jerked free. They argued. The man put both palms up in a gesture of pleading. The boy turned and glared at me once more, then charged toward me in strong, quick strides.

My gut seized at his fierce gaze and swift approach. A split decision of fight or flight. Flight. Definitely flight.

His gait quickened. I nearly dropped the keys uttering a couple of son-of-a’s, before I got the key into the ignition. The engine growled.

I slammed the lock down with my palm and hazarded a look. With only a pane of glass dividing us, his gaze bored through me. But behind his intense stare I thought I detected more. Confusion? Distress?

Surprisingly, an arrow of sympathy pierced me. My hand gripped the shifter – frozen, unable it seemed to pull it into reverse.

His eyes held me, almost . . . imploring?

I wavered, but finally tore my eyes from his and accidentally hit the gas before pulling the shifter into gear. The tires squealed as I ripped out of my parking spot. A slouched boy yanked his friend’s shirt back as I narrowly missed them. As I burned through the rows of parked cars, a few bystanders shouted something to the effect of, “Watch it, psycho!”

I looked for my pursuer in the rear-view mirror, and saw his figure, distorted by the dribbles of dried egg on my back window. He stood there, the only still figure in a swarm of activity, and watched me drive away.

In Maggie Robinson’s sparkling new
series, the quaint village in Gloucestershire is where the wayward
sons and daughters of Great Britain’s finest families come for some
R&R—and good old-fashioned “rehab.” But sometimes they find
much more…

No one at Puddling-on-the-Wold ever
expected to see Sarah Marchmain enter through its doors. But after
the legendary Lady’s eleventh-hour rejection of the man she was
slated to marry, she was sent here to restore her reputation . . .
and change her mind. It amused Sadie that her father, a duke, would
use the last of his funds to lock her up in this fancy facility—she
couldn’t be happier to be away from her loathsome family and have
some time to herself. The last thing she needs is more romantic
distraction…

As a local baronet’s son, Tristan
Sykes is all too familiar with the spoiled, socialite residents of
the Puddling Rehabilitation Foundation—no matter how real their
problems may be. But all that changes when he encounters Sadie, a
brave and brazen beauty who wants nothing more than to escape the
life that’s been prescribed for her. If only Tristan could find a
way to convince the Puddling powers-that-be that Sadie is unfit for
release, he’d have a chance to explore the intense attraction that
simmers between them—and prove himself fit to make her his bride…

Maggie Robinson didn’t know she
wanted to write until she woke up in the middle of the night once
really annoyed with her husband. Instead of smothering him with a
pillow, she decided to get up and write—to create the perfect
man—at least on a computer screen. Only to discover that fictional
males can be just as resistant to direction as her husband. The
upside is that she’s finally using her English degree and is still
married to her original, imperfect hero. Since she’s imperfect,
too, that makes them a perfect match. Until her midnight keyboarding,
she had been a teacher, librarian, newspaper reporter, administrative
assistant to two non-profits, community volunteer, and mother of four
in seven different states. Now Maggie can call herself a romance
writer in Maine. There’s nothing she likes better than writing
about people who make mistakes, but don’t let the mistakes make
them.

I wake up at 5:45 so that the kids and I can leave at 6:30 in order to be at school by 7:30. I’m a teacher at a private school, and my children are fortunate to attend–but we live some distance away. After school, I usually have play rehearsals or voice lessons until the evening, so I generally get home around 6:00 or 7:00. Then we have supper, and I write until bedtime. Then I try to always help get the kids to bed, and then write until I go to sleep–which is almost always far too late!

This is a heartfelt personal testimony from a Christian woman and her hope to share it with others. When we have a personal testimony of something that has made us different in a happy way, we want to share it with any who may want to hear it. This book has done a great job of keeping this point of view in mind and, without force, lets other see and feel her spiritual journey. (more…)